A Pair of Victories for LGBTQ Students

Last month, the Michigan Board of Education voted 6-2 to approve a new set of guidelines for the state’s schools that protect LGBTQ students from harassment and ensure that they are respected in accordance with their gender identity. The vote came after months of pushback from conservatives, AKA anti-trans bigots, and after the school board made some revisions; this new version, though, is still a huge step forward:

Schools must explicitly protect students from any kind of harassment or discrimination based on their sexual orientation, gender identity, and/or gender expression.

All district staff and even board members should be trained about issues impacting LGBTQ students.

Schools should support the formation of gay-straight alliances.

Curricula should be inclusive of LGBTQ topics.

Students who come out as transgender should have their gender identity respected, including the name and pronouns they use, the facilities they use, and the athletic teams on which they play.

Trans students should not be outed to their parents if that would endanger their health, safety, or well-being.

These are great steps toward making LGBTQ students feel accepted, and protected from harassment, at school.

And to show you how one state can be more ignorant and intolerant of differences … these guidelines pushed through in Michigan are nearly identical to protections set up for Texas, before a federal judge in that state blocked the federal government from enforcing these protections nationwide.

And while these new Michigan guidelines are based on the federal interpretation of Title IX, the Texas injunction could not stop the Board from implementing them … because, at least in Michigan, right is right, and all students, whether you choose to understand gender identity and sexual orientation, all deserve the right to the same education in schools and the same treatment in schools.

It’s called respect, Texas, and Michigan is doing it.

And while that win in Michigan was for all LGBTQ students, there was a smaller, though no less important victory, in Wisconsin where, thanks to a federal judge in that state, 17-year-old Ashton Whitaker won’t have to worry when he uses the bathroom any longer.

Last month U.S. District Judge Pamela Pepper ruled that the Kenosha Unified School District must stop its discriminatory bathroom policy that singled out Ashton, and allow him to use the bathroom that aligns with his gender identity while the case moves forward:

“For the first time this year, I feel like I can actually make it through my senior year of high school just like any other boy in my class. It’s awful going to school every day with the constant stress and stigma from being segregated from my peers and from administrators watching my every move just because of who I am. I’m so relieved I’ll be able to just go to class, apply to college, and graduate without worrying if I’ll get in trouble for using the restroom.”

Prior to Pepper’s ruling, Ashton wouldn’t use any bathroom at school, for fear of reprisals, and that’s what caused his family to file suit against the district. In response, and in all communications, the school constantly referred to Ashton by his female birth name and using female pronouns; the school prohibited him rooming with other boys on school field trips, and tried to block him from running for prom king.

And yet the most vile part of the Kenosha Unified School’s vendetta — and it was, and is, since the case is not yet resolved, a vendetta — was when they proposed making him wear bright green wristbands or stickers so that staff could easily identify him and police his bathroom usage.

I seem to recall similar badges used in concentration camps in WWII to identify the homosexuals; I would have hoped we’d come further than that …

And the school did go further, saying that the only way they would ever accommodate Ashton would be if they saw proof of a surgical transition even though, at seventeen, Ashton is one year shy of the age limit for such a procedure.

All because Ashton Whitaker wants to pee … and be referred to by his name.

Kenosha Unified School district has indicated they will appeal Pepper’s ruling, so Ashton’s senior year is not really in the clear. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals could stay the injunction and require him to continue enduring the discrimination while the case proceeds, something the Supreme Court recently did in the case of Gavin Grimm, a Virginia high school senior, who has been fighting Gloucester County School District for the right to pee.

Things are moving, things are changing, the march goes on …

Think Progress: Michigan
Think Progress: Wisconsin

School Board Member Julie Williams Needs An Education

Julie Williams is a member of the Jefferson County school board out there in Colorado, but clearly this child needs a little educating herself.

Last week, Julie Williams posted to her Facebook wall a link to an article from Save California that, ahem, encouraged families to keep their students home from school last Friday — the National Day of Silence which supports LGBT students in schools — and “away from perverse indoctrination” of the “homosexual-bisexual-transsexual agenda.”

Lovely for a school board member to post, but what is remarkably idiotic about Julie Williams is her reasoning for the post link, which she subsequently took down; she says she was unfamiliar with the group and was “rattled” after learning it was recognized as a hate group:

“To be honest with you, I didn’t read the article. I just saw it and thought I was sharing information with parents.”

A school board member who doesn’t bother to read a piece of information before she shares it? How is that possible that she has anything to do with education?  Julie? Hon? Maybe next time you should read what you post before you post it or share it; better yet, why don’t you stay off social media until you learn to read period, m’kay?

Still, we learn more about Julie Williams the more she talks about what she didn’t read, didn’t know, but shared on Facebook anyway: when contacted by Chalkbeat she says she does not support the statements in the Save California newsletter but:

“I believe in choice — who you are and want to be and what you want to do.”

Um, Julie? Might I suggest further reading before you speak, because homosexuality, like heterosexuality, is not a choice.

Luckily, the Superintendent of Jeffco Public Schools, Dan McMinimee clarified the district’s position on Save California and the National Day of Silence:

“As Jeffco Schools always strives to foster an environment that encourages students to feel safe, to learn, and to thrive, we respect students’ rights to participate in Day of Silence, a student-led effort, and to express themselves as they prefer. We celebrate freedom from bullying.”

Maybe they could teach that to Julie Williams?

photo credit: Nicholas Garcia

story via: Chalkbeat